Uzumaki Naruto: Stitch Demon
by SilentFang
Summary: Yahiko, Nagato, and Konan find a bloody and beaten Naruto during a mission in Konoha and end up adopting him. He comes back 7 years later during the Chunin Exams to make himself known. Watch as Naruto becomes the Stitch Demon of Oto. AU, StrongNaruto, FemHaku, minor OC's. M for possible stuff in later chapters. In the process of rewriting chapters 1-4. Chapter 1 rewritten
1. Prologue: New Family

"Normal Speech"

_'Thoughts'_

**"Bijuu/Summoning"**

_**"Bijuu/Summon thoughts"**_

_Letters/Reports/Other Documents_

**A/N: Hello everyone, SilentFang here. This is my first attempt at writing a fanfiction so please, bear with me. Reviews and criticism are welcome, and if I made any errors then don't hesitate to point them out, or if you have a general question contact me via PM or review.**

**Things in this story are a bit different. Yahiko, Nagato, and Konan all found Otogakure together, and Orochimaru is the one that defeats Hanzo and takes over Ame, turning it into his base of operations. Some members of Akatsuki are still allied with them, but others are evil and will still pose a threat. There will be a few OC's in this story to fill in a few spots(more than one, but less than five), but none of them will be super overpowered.**

**Thanks for reading, be sure to review, and enjoy!**

**Chapter revised**

* * *

**Prologue Chapter: New Family**

Run. That's all he could do. Run as fast as could and find a place to hide so they wouldn't catch him.

A small child, no more than six years old was pushing his small body to its limit. His sun-kissed blonde hair matted with blood and dirt, his slightly tanned skin covered in cuts and bruises, his cut up beige shorts and the remains of his black shirt, torn and bloodied. The ruined garments were all that was left of his worldly possessions, not that he had much in the first place, but since the mob burned his apartment down, he can really say he had nothing. When they set the apartment on fire, he was held down and forced to watch, unable to do anything while his captors said it was only the start to their revenge. They planned on throwing him in the fire too, to 'send the demon back to hell' as they proclaimed, but he was able to escape while they were distracted by their excitement for his death.

Pushing through his pain, he kept running towards a large tower in the center of the village, the one place he could go to seek help, but he was still quite far away. In an effort to throw off his pursuers, he turned down a narrow side street, then another, and another, until finally coming to a stop in an alleyway when he was sure he had lost them. Panting, he looked for somewhere to hide from the mob until he was rested and sure it was safe enough to start making his way towards the tower again. He would be safe once he was there. The Old Man would protect him, just like he always did. He was about to hide behind some old trash cans and garbage bags when he heard something.

Looking up he saw a man crouched on a roof, looking dead at him with a malicious smile on his face.

"I FOUND HIM! THE DEMON IS OVER HERE!"

_'__Oh no. No, no, no, no, NO!__ THERE WERE NINJA IN THE MOB!''_ He thought frantically. He was still too far from the tower! There was no way he could escape now! Not if there were ninja after him as well as the normal villagers! Just as he was about to run again, two more men appeared and cut off his escape route. They slowly started to advance, forcing the boy to back into a wall. As he fell to the ground on his butt, shivering in fear, the rest of the mob caught up. They were all shouting the same thing:

"TIME TO DIE, YOU DEMON!"

"YOU'LL PAY FOR WHAT YOU DID!"

"HOW DARE YOU CONTINUE TO SHOW YOUR FACE AROUND HERE?!"

"WE WILL FINISH WHAT THE YONDAIME STARTED!"

It was always like this. The entire village absolutely hated him, and he didn't know why. He had never done anything to them, yet they still hated at him. They still beat him. They still gave him rotten food to eat and abused him for no reason on an almost daily basis. It was maddening. Especially when nobody would tell him the reason. Whenever he asked, the beatings just seemed to get worse.

'_Why? Why does this always happen to me?'_ The boy thought to himself_ 'Am I really a demon? Did I really do something so awful to these people that they feel the need to beat me?-' _He was forcefully brought out of his thoughts by a bone shaking kick to his face. Cheers echoed throughout the crowd and more people started to join in, punching, kicking, even stabbing and slashing at him. All he could do was roll himself up into a ball and cry as he took their blows all over his body.

It went on for what seemed like forever until suddenly his tormentors stopped. The blonde boy looked up and saw the crowd begin to part, and a man with silver hair, navy blue pants, and a navy blue long sleeved shirt under a green flak jacket walked up to him. He was obviously a shinobi, at least Chunin rank if the flak jacket was any indication.

"Hold the demon down." the silver haired man said while pulling a sharp object out of a pouch on his left leg. "I want to finish this once and for all." Four men walked over to the beaten child and kicked him over so he was lying flat on his stomach, then proceeded to rip off the remains of his shirt, as they held down his arms and legs. The man in the flak jacket then bent down and looked the child in his eyes, taking satisfaction in the fear they displayed.

"Well now, Demon-kun" the man said in a mocking tone. "It wasn't nice of you to run away from us in the middle of our fun! I thought you liked fire seeing as how you almost burnt down the entire village at one point!"

"What are you talking about?!" the child screamed "I never did that! Please let me go!" he pleaded as his tears started to mix with the blood and grime on his face.

"QUIT LYING YOU DEMON SCUM!" The man yelled as he kicked him in the side, eliciting a yell from the captive boy "Now stay still and let me continue marking you, so the world will know exactly what you are before we send you back to hell!" the silver haired man yelled out so the mob could hear him clearly, eliciting another round of cheers. With that said, he plunged his weapon into the child's back until he could hear the dull _THOK_ of his kunai hitting the back of the boys rib cage, and started cutting.

The child screamed as loud as he could, desperately crying out for help from someone, anyone, to help him. As his eyes darted around searching for a way to escape, all he could see was the looks of glee and satisfaction on the crowds face before his vision started to go black. In the back of his mind, he almost hoped he would never wake up again...

* * *

Three figures stopped at the North gate of the village Konohagakure no Sato. Each were wearing a black cloak with a red cloud pattern adorned on it, the mark of their organization.

The first was a man that had lightly tanned skin, vibrant orange hair, and light blue eyes that exuded mischievousness and leadership. To his left, a man slightly taller than him with very pale skin and dark red hair, almost the color of blood, with very dark sunglasses covering his eyes just looked up at the enormous gate. He seemed to have an air of slight nervousness around him, which was quite unusual for him. their third member, a female with pale blue hair, adorned in a bun held up by an origami flower, and amber eyes with a piercing on her lower lip. She seemed to have a calmness and serenity around her.

"Well guys," the leader exclaimed with a big smile "it looks like we finally made it to Konoha! One step closer to our dream... I hope." He looked to the man next to him. "Yo, Nagato. You sure you're going to be okay?" he asked turning to the now identified Nagato "Even though this is sensei's home village, your parents murderers are from here too..."

"Yes Yahiko." Nagato replied. "I will be fine. Jiraiya-sensei has helped me let go of my hatred a long time ago. I will not hate this village for the actions of the few." Yahiko just nodded then turned to their female companion, as she hooked his arm around his. "Ready to go Konan-chan?"Yahiko asked the blue haired beauty. Konan nodded and gave him a small, reserved smile and the three walked into the village.

As they made their way down the main road, they stopped noticed there was some sort of celebration going on. There were food stalls and games all along the street. "Oh right! It's October 10th right?" Yahiko asked. "This must be the festival they throw every year to honor of the defeat of the Kyuubi six years ago by the hands of the Yondaime hokage." Konan said while observing everything. Civilians and ninja alike were walking around enjoying the festivities; children were running around laughing and having a good time. The trio slightly smiled as they took in the lighthearted atmosphere and continued on their way towards the Hokage tower where the leader of the village worked.

After walking a few blocks down the road, Nagato stopped suddenly and turned his head, staring intently down a darkened side street with a puzzled expression. Noticing their companion was no longer with them, Yahiko and Konan stopped and looked back at him.

"Hey man, is everything alright?" Nagato was quiet for a moment before answering. "I feel... an unusual amount of chakra over there. I'm going to go look. Follow me." He took off down the side street while his companions just looked at each other and followed behind him.

"What is so unusual about this chakra signature that you are making us go out of our way to see? We _are_ in a ninja village. There are bound to be a few strange chakra signatures every now and then." Konan asked whilst looking at Nagato. He was quiet for a moment and then shook his head. "It's not just strange; it's just how much of it there is. Or more importantly, how much of it there _isn't_. At first I thought it was just an animal or pet or something but... it feels too human-like. The thing that's worrying me is how weak the signal is, and the fact that it's not moving. Whoever it is needs help, and fast."

Just as Nagato finished, the trio came upon a small street cluttered with trash and drops of a red liquid everywhere. Upon closer inspection, they found it to be blood. "Oh no" Nagato whispered before turning to a space between two buildings. There, lying in the middle was a small boy, bruised and bleeding profusely from his back and a broken arm that was bent horribly out of place.

"Oh my god!" Konan yelled. "Nagato, go find the Hokage and tell him about this, NOW!" Yahiko barked out at his friend "Roger!" Nagato took off at full speed, jumping to the rooftops and heading toward the hokage tower. Yahiko and Konan ran up to the boy, who was apparently conscious, but couldnt move too well. Upon hearing Yahiko's yell, the boy's eyes widened and he immediately tried crawling away, but could only make it a few inches before he collapsed again.

"P-Please," the boy said before trying to inch his way in the opposite direction from them again. "Pl-please, no more! I don't want to die! I'm sorry for whatever I did! Just please, don't hurt me anymore!" The boy was crying, tears falling out of his deep cerulean eyes and smudging the dirt and blood caked on to his face. Upon seeing this, Yahiko immediately stopped his advance.

"It is alright little one." He said in a low voice. "We are here to help-"

"LIAR!" the boy yelled back, his voice angry and hoarse and filled fear. "I WON'T FALL FOR THAT AGAIN! THE LAST TIME SOMEONE SAID THAT THEY TRIED TO BURY ME ALIVE!" He somehow managed to make it to the other side of the alley so back was against the wall, his good arm clutching his broken one. Konan waked forward a few steps and kneeled down in front of him, and held out her hand, mentally frowning at the fact that the boy seemed to flinch when she did so. "

It is okay young one." she said in the kindest way possible. "We won't hurt you. We just want to get you to a hospital and fix you up. Don't worry, you'll be fine in a little whil-" "STOP LYING!" the boy yelled again causing Konan to frown._ 'Whoever did this to him had obviously done it multiple times before. He won't trust anyone...'_ she thought sadly.

"She isn't lying" said a voice from behind them. The three in the alleyway turned to see a man in his late fifties wearing white and red robes and a matching hat with the kanji for 'Fire' on it, with Nagato standing beside him. He was Hiruzen Sarutobi, the reinstated Sandaime hokage "It is okay Naruto. They are friends. Let's go to the hospital and get you fixed up." The boy, now identified as Naruto, processed what was said to him before finally nodding and hesitantly reached out for Konan's hand. As he took it, she lifted him up as best as she could without agitating his injuries, and handed him to the hokage who muttered a quick thanks.

The adults noted that his injuries were far worse than they thought. While the wounds on Naruto's arms and legs were mostly superficial and would heal relatively quickly, the wounds on his torso were deep. He has cuts and lacerations all over his stomach and chest, a large bruise directly over his navel and many small burn marks all over his sides. The hokage shot a solemn look to the boy as he passed out from the pain of his injuries, before turning towards the hospital with the other three trailing behind him.

* * *

A few hours later, Yahiko, Nagato, Konan, and Hiruzen were sitting in a hospital room with a bandaged and sleeping Naruto on the bed. "Hokage-sama..." Yahiko said while looking at the boy. "Why did this happen? Who would ever stoop so low as to beat a small child and leave him for dead?" Yahiko was furious but holding himself back. Konan was also trembling, clenching her fists repeatedly, and Nagato held a scowl on his face. The hokage sighed and looked at the three of them before doing a few quick hand seals and setting up a basic privacy barrier so no sound could get in or out.

Sighing again, Sarutobi replied "I suppose at least owe you three an explanation as gratitude for finding him before he was hurt more, or worse. You have heard of the Kyuubi attack on this village six years ago, correct?" After a slight pause all three of them nodded and the hokage continued "During that battle, Minato Namikaze, our Yondaime hokage defeated it at the cost of his own life..."

"Wait a minute; I thought Bijuu couldn't be killed?" Yahiko said while scratching his chin.

"They can't." A new voice appeared from the window, and when everyone looked over they saw a very big man with long spiky white hair in a ponytail, wearing a pale green outfit with a red vest over it and a horned headband with the kanji for "Oil" on it.

"Jiraiya!" the Sandaime exclaimed, a bit surprised to see his old student "Hello sensei." Jiraiya said back absentmindedly while walking over to the hospital bed, inspecting the still sleeping Naruto, then turning to the other occupants of the room.

"How did you get in here sensei? I thought there was a privacy barrier up." Nagato asked.

"Oh Please. Just who the hell do you think I am? I am the mighty Toad Sage of Mt. Myouboku! Do you honestly think a tiny privacy seal will keep me out of any place I really wanted to go?" he replied. Nagato just nodded and Konan spoke up.

"Getting back on track, if Bijuu cannot be killed then how did the Yondaime stop the Kyuubi?"

"Well," the Sandaime started, grateful to get back to his explanation before Jiraiya brought them too off task. "Bijuu are large masses of malevolent chakra given a form, so in a sense they aren't _really_ alive. The only way to stop a Bijuu is to seal. Whether it be in a very old, very powerful artifact. Or…" "Inside a newborn child." Jiraiya finished as the hokage nodded slowly.

"Then he is…" Konan started as her and her two companions eyes widened "Yes." Hiruzen replied "He is the container of the Kyuubi no Kitsune, strongest of the nine Bijuu." The hokage sighed before continuing "Somehow this information had leaked to the general public despite my best efforts. The Yondaime wanted this child to be seen as a hero. As the person who constantly holds back the Kyuubi from destroying everything and killing everyone in this village. But the people didn't listen. All they see him as is the raging monster who attacked the village and slaughtered their loved ones."

"So…" Nagato spoke up "They see him has the proverbial kunai, and not the pouch that said kunai is stored in?" Jiraiya and Hiruzen both nodded solemnly "Idiots! They permanently scarred a small child's mind and body and forever engraved his back with a derogatory term because they choose not to understand something that was explained to them?!" Hiruzen and Jiraiya nodded again, knowing that the scar he was referring to was the word 'DEMON' that was cut into Naruto's back. Even with the Kyuubi's healing abilities, some of the scars and burns he received today wouldn't fully heal.

"What of the boy's parents?" Konan asked. "I would hate to think they abandoned him just because of what he holds…"

"They both died in the attack" Jiraiya answered her. Everyone went quiet, the only sound in the room coming being the rhythmic beeping of Naruto's heart monitor.

"Well.." Yahiko started "Who not put the kid up for adoption? I'm sure there has to be at least _one _person out there who would take him in." Sarutobi shook his head slowly. "I tried that. No civilian families would take him in, and we cannot give him to one of our ninja clans seeing as they would only take advantage of his- or rather, his 'tenants' power for political gain." The room quieted down once again until Nagato looked at Jiraiya and spoke up

"Sensei. Isn't Naruto the name of the character in your first book? Does that mean you are related to him somehow? I doubt you came to see him just because of his 'tenant'." Jiraiya was silent for a moment before answering. "Yeah… I'm the kid's godfather. His parents did indeed name him after the character in my book."

"So why not adopt him and take him with you?" Jiraiya looked at his three students before saying "I couldn't. I'm constantly on the road maintaining my spy network. It would be too dangerous for me to take a kid with me. Besides, I didn't even know he was being treated like this. This is my first time being back in Konoha for four years… I thought he was still in the orphanage or already adopted or something… I knew he wouldn't be treated fair, but I didn't think it would ever get this bad."

The hokage nodded "Seeing as how I am almost constantly busy, I cannot take him in either. I don't know what else to do-"

"I'll adopt him" Konan blurted out, much to the surprise of Hiruzen and Jiraiya. "But Konan, aren't you three travelling as well? That just putting him in the same situation as he would be in if I took him." Jiraiya stated.

"Yes we are travelling." Yahiko spoke up "But it's nowhere near as dangerous as what you're doing sensei." The hokage raised an eyebrow. "Now that you mention it Yahiko-san, what exactly _are_ you travelling for my boy? If I recall you had requested a meeting with me until Nagato-san came and brought me to the alley"

Yahiko nodded before answering "Nagato, Konan, and I are trying to build our own hidden village. Otogakure, The Village Hidden in the Sound." This piqued Sarutobi's interest. _'They are obviously good people with a good dream… but I am a bit uneasy about letting almost total strangers take Naruto away. And I'm sure the Council won't like that I'm giving them our Jinchuuriki but…' _Hiruzen gave Naruto a quick glance _'I at least owe him this much. I have failed not only him, but both Minato and Kushina for allowing this to happen without my knowledge.' _

Stroking his beard, Sarutobi addressed Yahiko "So I'm assuming you came to me to sign a document saying that I, along with the rest of Konoha and it's council acknowledge you as an independent nation?"

Yahiko nodded. "As you know, a country cannot have its own hidden village until a majority of the five Kage from the largest villages agree. We are travelling to each of the five major villages to try and get recognized."

Hiruzen nodded. "Can you tell me a bit about your Village Yahiko-san?" "Of course, Hokage-sama. We are located in the Land of Rice, and have already received the Daimyo's support and permission to build our village there. We also have our own military force and both a shinobi and civilian academy built and we are working on a system to stabilize our economy. Along with your signature of approval, we were also hoping for some sort of treaty or trade agreement with you."

"I see. Impressive" Hiruzen said as he was contemplating everything Yahiko told him. "But before I can sign this I must know that your country is trustworthy. I know you three personally are very noble, if you weren't, you wouldn't have saved Naruto here." He said motioning to the blonde boy "And the fact that you are Jiraiya's old students is nothing to sneeze at either… But I need to see some sort of proof that your village won't hinder or betray mine."

"Konan." Yahiko said looking to his female companion. Konan nodded and withdrew a blue scroll with a wave pattern on it from her cloak and handed it to Yahiko. "This is our letter of acknowledgement from the Godaime Mizukage, Mei Terumi." He said "It also includes our trade agreements and a possible alliance if we are successful and help stabilize their economy as well, since they are still recovering from their civil war."

Sarutobi just took the scroll, reading it over quickly and handing it back to Yahiko while nodding. "Very well, while we cannot have an alliance yet, I will allow trade and acknowledge you as a full-fledged hidden village. May I ask what other Kage you have spoken to thus far?"

Yahiko nodded before answering "Including you, there is the Mizukage, who accepted us, and the Tsuchikage who denied us." _'No surprise there.' _Hiruzen thought. '_Oonoki was always an isolationist and hated the idea of minor villages'. _

Thinking for a bit longer Hiruzen nodded and came to a decision. "Very well... I will allow you to adopt Naruto." Upon hearing this, the three Oto nin and Jiraiya all lit up "I will start drawing up the adoption papers as soon as he is awake. Oh, speak of the devil…"

Everyone turned to see Naruto waking up. He looked around at everyone in the room before his eyes rested on the hokage. "Jiji… where am I? What happened?" The hokage gave Naruto a small smile an answered "These three nice people found you half dead in the streets and helped bring you to the hospital." Naruto looked at the Oto group and muttered a barely audible 'thank you'. "That's not all Naruto." Hiruzen said as the boy turned back to him "They also wish to adopt you. You can have a real family if you wish." At this, Naruto's eyes widened to the size of saucers. _'A… A family? I thought I wasn't allowed to have a family? I thought nobody wanted me?"_

Konan, seeing the look on Naruto's face, smiled a bit before walking over and sitting in an empty chair next to his bed._ "_Hello Naruto." She said in a soft voice. "My name is Konan." She offered him a small smile. _'Wow' _Naruto thought. _'She's so pretty. And she has a nice voice too...'_ "I'm going to be your new mother."

Naruto looked at her for a second and said "Okaa-san?" Konan nodded and hugged him close. He tensed a bit, causing her to frown slightly, but he soon melted into the embrace. It was the nicest and gentlest thing he had ever experienced. Behind her, Yahiko and Nagato and introduced themselves as well. "

Hey kid, My Name is Yahiko! Well, I guess if Konan is your mother, then that makes me your father!" Yahiko blurted out with a huge grin on his face. Naruto looked over at Yahiko and smiled. "Tou-san" he said in a small voice. "That's right!" the orang-haired man responded before walking over and ruffling Naruto's hair while laughing

"Ahem." Nagato cleared his throat in order to bring Naruto's attention to him. "Hello little one, my name is Nagato. Seeing as how Yahiko took the father slot, I guess all that leaves me with is Uncle." Naruto nodded at him then took another look at his new family before he started crying.

Konan chuckled softly as she hugged him again and asked "Come now, why are you crying?" Naruto just looked at her and said "I-I was always told that I w-wasn't allowed to have a family… that I didn't deserve one because I was a demon…"

"NARUTO!" Hiruzen shouted causing the blonde to jump a bit. "You are not and never will be a demon. Don't let _anyone_ tell you otherwise, okay?" The small boy just nodded and cried more. "Isn't this great sensei!" Yahiko turned around to see Jiraiya no longer there. He wondered when he left before shrugging and turned back to the newest addition to his family who was still crying tears of joy into Konan's cloak.

* * *

**One month later**

Naruto was fully healed, was bought new clothes, and after a LOT of covering up so Konoha's Civilian and Shinobi council would think he died from his last beating (something the civilians and most shinobi were ecstatic about and most with the exception of two or three Clan heads, an ANBU officer, and some Jounin and Chunin who were told later), Yahiko, Nagato, Konan, and Naruto were ready to leave Konoha.

A small group of spectators were just outside the main gate, watching as the family made their way down the main road with Yahiko holding an excited Naruto on his shoulders, towards their next destination, Sunagakure. Hiruzen was standing at the gate, along with Teuchi Ichiraku and his daighter Ayame, the only people that let Naruto eat food at their small ramen stand (and would have adopted him themselves if they weren't so poor), smiling sadly. Although Hiruzen never had much time to spend with Naruto, the small energetic was like a grandson to him. It was hard watching him go, but after seeing him hurt so badly and how he was so happy to finally have a real family, Hiruzen knew it a good decision.

Right before they were out of eyesight, the hokage noticed the group stop, Naruto flailing his arms and climbing off of Yahiko's shoulders before running back up to the old Hokage and the Ichiraku family. "Jiji! Teuchi-Ojisan! Ayame-Neesan!" Naruto deeply bowed before saying "Thanks for everything! I promise I'll be back to visit really soon!" before gathering them in a group hug and without waiting for a reply, ran back to his new family that was waiting for him with smiles on their faces. Hiruzen smiled proudly as Teuchi yelled that he would always have a seat at their restaurant and Ayame yelled to be safe.

"Hey Naru-chan" Konan asked as Naruto was getting back on Yahiko's shoulders. "Hmm?" Naruto replied while looking at his mother. "What was so important that you had to run all the way back to the gate to tell them?" Naruto just grinned widely and said "I made a promise! A really important one too"

"Oh really?" Nagato said looking at his adoptive nephew. "Promises are a big responsibility! Be sure not to break it." Naruto just laughed and said "Of course not! I never go back on my word Oji-san!" Nagato chuckled slightly as they continued to make their way down the road.

* * *

**A/N: Well, that's the first chapter. I hope you all like the revision is better than the first draft, haha. **

**Seeing as how this is the prologue, the next chapter makes a huge time skip, about a week and a half before the beginning of the Chunin exams. It's there where we'll meet Naruto's team and see how he grew up in Oto and the whole thing about with his family and friends. Important things that happen between him leaving with his new family and the start of the next chapter will be covered in flashbacks. Thanks for reading, see you next chapter! And don't forget to review!**


	2. Return and Encounter

**A/N: Hello again everybody. Thanks for finding this interesting enough to actually get through the first chapter. Like I said, this is my first time writing a fic so it means a lot. Anyway, this chapter starts off about a week and a half before the Chuunin exams. The beginning is Naruto arriving in Konoha, then describing how Naruto and his two teammates look. Mostly a transition chapter. It also has a small fight scene and a little look into Naruto's skill set. Without further ado, Lets get this started!**

"Talking"

_'Thinking'_

**"Bijuu/Summons"**

**_'Bijuu/Summon_**** thoughts'**

Written Report

* * *

**Chapter 1: Return and Encounter**

"Oh man, why is guard duty so BORING!" At the check in booth just inside Eastgate of Konohagakure one of the men sitting there was complaining. Kotetsu, a chuunin who always sort of blended into the background, was pretty average. He was a man of average build, with medium length spiky black hair, black eyes and a bandage around his nose. Next to him was a equally average man who was resting his head on his left hand and trying not to fall asleep. Izumo was Kotetsu's partner for life. He had on a standard chuunin outfit, and the cloth his hitai-ate was tied on like a bandana over his dark brown hair, some of which was sticking out and covering his right eye. Sitting upright to stretch his back and yawn, Izumo slowly drawls out "C'mon Kotetsu. It's the same thing every day. If you hate it so much, just take the Jounin exams." "Aw screw you Izumo, you know perfectly well that we both don't have what it takes. Chuunin for life remember?" Izumo just yawned again and shrugged. "And besides," Kotetsu continued "It's a week until the chuunin exams! There should at least be SOME genin teams coming this way!" Izumo sighed "Most teams go through either the North or South gate. It's not my fault that you suck at drawing lots." Kotetsu was angry at his partner and was bout to yell at him but just then he heard a strange noise that they could barely make out. Izumo perked up upon hearing it too. Both guards looked outside the gate to see two black specks on the horizon with a billowing cloud of dust behind either of them. Squinting to see what the hell was causing such a dust storm, the two chuunin could see that they were... people. Fast people. VERY fast people. Making their way directly to the gate. "Aw Yeah! Finally some excitement!" Kotetsu exclaimed while pulling out a kunai. Izumo followed suit and both just stood there listening to the battle cry of the two approaching figures as it got louder and louder.

"uuuuoooooooOOOOOOOOOOOOOHHHH HHHH! GOAL!" In the blink of an eye, the two figures that could just barely be made out were somehow right in front of the gate. One looking absolutely fine and the other looking like he could drop dead at any moment. Getting a good look at them they saw that the two figures were actually four, the first two one carrying someone on their back. One of them let his passenger off and immediately jumped on top of the nearest telephone pole. "IM THE GREATEST!" the one on the ground exclaimed through pants "I TOTALLY FUCKING WON THAT TIME!" he gloated as he gently set their 'passenger' on the ground. "You should know you could never beat me!" He went to sit down on the ground to catch his breath. Getting a good look at him, the guards noticed he was really tanned, almost Kumo tanned, had really dark purple hair, that was somehow spikey and wavy at the same time. He was wearing a purple scarf over a black cloak that only covered his right side and seemed to have been cut off so it wouldn't go below his waist. He was wearing a Nave blue shirt and black shorts that stopped at his mid-calves where his hitai-ate was tied around the left leg, and wooden Geta sandals. When he turned to look at the guards they could see that his right eye was covered by a crimson eyepatch and there was a scar running down under it. "OI! YOU TWO CHICKEN SHITS THAT GOT SCARED BECAUSE OF A LITTLE RACE! WHO WON?!"

"Now now Shinji, what did I tell you about calling other people names?" The guards looked at the person he set down. She had pale blue hair that was up in a bun and held up by an origami flower. She was wearing a standard Jounin flak jacket, and had a black shirt whose sleeves went down past her hands and was embroidered with a red cloud pattern and black shinobi pants that seemed to be... a bit _too _tight as they accentuated her hips and legs and led straight down into her dark grey high heeled sandals. Her amber eyes turned towards them and she gave them an apologetic look while slightly bowing her head. "Please excuse my student, he can get a bit... excitable at times" She lifted her head and flashed them a quick smile before going back to calm Shinji down. When she was done, she turned to Kotetsu and Izumo. "Allow me to introduce myself. My name is Konan, and I am a jounin from Otogakure. We are here to check our team in for the Chuunin Exams." Breaking out of their stupor, the duo went over to their booth and handed Shinji and Konan a form. "OI HAKU!" Shinji called to his other teammate "WHO DO YOU THINK WON?!" Kotetsu turned around to give the previously unnoticed girl a form.

"Hmm... Seeing as how there was no true way to know for sure, I say we call this one a draw for now." The now identified Haku was wearing a light blue battle kimono with grey hakama and dark blue sandals. She had long, thin black hair that perfectly framed her porcelin face and her Oto Hitai-ate on her forehead. "TIE MY ASS!" Shinji yelled back. "YOU'RE ONLY SAYING THAT BECAUSE YOU DON'T WANT YOUR _PRECIOUS _NARUTO TO BE EMBARRASSED OVER HIS HUMILIATING DEFEAT!" Shinji then found himself getting hit over the head by a blushing Haku. _'Wait a minute...' _Izumo though to himself. _'Did he say NARUTO?! No no no, that kid is supposed to be dead. There's no way it's the same person' _Kotetsu, who was too busy oogling Konan to notice the name Shinji spurted out suddenly remembered something. "Wait a minute... uh... excuse me." All the Oto nin looked up at Kotetsu "Aren't you missing someone? Where's the other guy?" "Right here" said a voice from behind him that made him jump. "GEEZ KID!" Kotetsu yelled "DON'T DO THAT!" The kid just chuckled sheepishly and grabbed a form from him. Getting a good look at him for the first time, the two chuunin guards gasped _'N-no way! I was right, it really IS him'_

In front of them stood a kid with sun-kissed bright blonde hair that was spiky up top then went down into a braid once it reached the bottom of his neck. The braid went down to the small of his back. He was wearing a red cloak that flowed behind him with a black flame pattern on the bottom and a black cloud pattern above that, and going from the top to the bottom down the middle of the back where his spine is a pattern that looked like the cloak was hastily stitched together. A rectangle was missing out of the cloak exposing his shoulder blades and the scar that was cut in the shape of the word 'DEMON'. He wasn't wearing a shirt underneath, exposing his lean ye muscled abdomen which was wrapped in bandages about halfway down his abs. On his biceps were three Hitai-ate, two on his left arm one that had the Oto symbol and one with the kanji for the number 'Nine' on it. His right arm had a Hitae-ate that had a stitch pattern similar to the one on his cloak, only more random and there were more stitches. The metal plate was also colored different shades of black and grey, making it look like it was hastily stitched together. Other than that he was wearing normal black shinobi pants and no shoes, instead opting to wrap everything but his heel and toes in bandages.

Before Kotetsu and Izumo could say anything though, they were already leaving towards the hotel the Exam participants were staying at, as their sensei made her way towards the hokage tower.

* * *

"Oi, Naruto." Shinji said after calming down "You sure you're going to okay for the exams? I mean, this is the village that used to kick the shit out of you nearly every day right?" Naruto just looked as Shinji and gave him a condescending grin. "What? You actually worried about me Shin-kun? Sorry man but I don't roll that way." Shinji growled a little bit and Hake blushed up a storm thinking of 'forbidden team mate love between two boys' she was broke out of her daydream by Naruto "Yo, earth to Haku. You done daydreaming yet sunshine?" Haku was about to answer when she was cut off by a loud yell directed towards her "HEY YOU!" A pink haired girl wearing a red quipao and dark green tights ran towards Haku, completely ignoring Naruto and Shinji. "YOU'RE THAT GIRL FROM THE BRIDGE BACK IN WAVE COUNTRY! WHAT ARE YOU DOING HERE?! TRYING TO ATTACK US?" "GEEZ GIRLY COULD YOU SHUT THE HELL UP, YOU SOUND LIKE A FUCKING BANSHEE!" Shinji yelled making Naruto and Haku cover their ears. "Hey Shin-kun, think you could turn the volume down a bit?" Naruto said to his teammate. Sakura looked over at Naruto and was almost instantly blown back by how cool he looked. _'He.. He almost looks as cool as Sasuke-kun!' _She exclaimed mentally. Naruto gave her a once-over in his mind and immediately had her figured out _'No muscle mass, small reserves, loud, wearing a ton of makeup. Yep, she's a fangirl alright.'_

"Sakura what the hell are you doing talking to these no-name wannabes from some shit village?" came a voice that sounded completely bored. "SASUKE-KUN!" Sakura shouted as she turned around, seeing Sasuke sitting in a tree. He was wearing a navy blue shirt with an extended collar, white arm warmers, white shorts with bandages around his calves, and blue shinobi sandals. "Hurry up we're supposed to be meeting Kakashi at the training grounds soon." "COMING SASUKE-KUN!" As Sasuke turned around, he was face-to-face with a none too happy Naruto. "Hn. What does trash like you want?" Naruto looked Sasuke dead in the eyes and said "Take back what you said about my village." Naruto replied in a calm voice, although both Haku and Shinji took a step back. They both knew what happened when you insulted something or someone Naruto held dear. " Hn. And what if I don't? What are you gonna do about it loser? Run home to your shitty village in no-name country and cry?" Sasuke gave Naruto a cocky smirk while Naruto stayed indifferent. "You have wasted two strikes Konoha-san" Naruto said in an even voice. "This is your second warning. One more remark derrogatory remark towards me home and I will have to get physical." Sasuke's cocky smirk just grew. "Oh please. Do you know who I am? Uchiha Sasuke. I'm the top percentage of Konoha's elite. You try and fight me I'll send you packing back home to your backwater village crying for your whore mothe-"

He never got to finish as Naruto's fist connected directly to Sasuke's face, sending him flying back and crashing through a wooden fence. "SASUKE-KUN!" Sakura shouted in complete shock while running after her crush. She helped him out of the debris, and he just pushed her off while steadying himself on his shaky feet _'W-what the hell was that!' _Sasuke thought in complete shock _'I couldn't even see him throw his punch! How the hell is he so strong?! I'm an elite while he's just some punk from some newbie village! He should be the one being slammed through the fence, NOT ME!' _Sasuke, in his fury went through several handsigns before pointing his right palm down and condensing lightning chakra so much it became visible in his hand as the sound of chirping birds filled the air. "Oho~ That's something new! That lightning chakra he gathered is nothing to sneeze at. If you get hit by that I doubt even you'll make it without some type of injury _O Fearless_ _Leader_" Shinji said to Naruto while playfully tapping on his shoulder. Haku's eyes widened "That jutsu is..." she muttered under her breath. "Huh? You say something Haku?" Shinki asked. "No... It was nothing..." Naruto looked away briefly to give a small frown to Haku, knowing what she was thinking.

Sasuke, also noticing Haku's expression, laughed at her. "Surprised bitch?! This is the same Jutsu that Kakashi used to kill that weakling Zabuza Momochi! And now I'LL use it to kill you and your little friends girlie!" Haku stiffened and was trembling with anger and Shinji just whistled and said "So _that's_ the justu that killed your old man huh?" Haku was about to charge Sasuke herself before Naruto put his hand up blocking her path "No Haku" he said in a deathly calm voice "Step back. You too Shin-kun. I'll take this one." They both nodded and took a few steps back as Naruto lifted the the sleeves of his cloak and channels chakra into seals on his wrists. Out pop two clawed Gauntlets made out of black metal, with a red cloud on the back of each one and a red stitch design etched into each finger. "GET READY LOSERS!"Sasuke yelled while charging forward, his attack making a beeline for Naruto's heart. Naruto just moved his fingers in an intricate pattern before putting one of his hands in his pocket and keeping the other one outstretched in a fist pointed toward Sasuke.

"Oh boy" Shinji said. Sakura who had gotten up and joined Shinji to watch the fight looked at him quizzically. "What?" "Your little boyfriend over there is about to get roughed up pretty badly." "What do you mean? Your friend didnt even do anything and Sasuke-kun is about to use his strongest attack! Besides, Sasuke-kun is a genius! He's invincible!" "Yeah right." Shinji replied with his voice dripping of sarcasm "And my right eye still works perfectly fine" he replied pointing towards his eyepatch covered eye. "Just shut up and watch Girlie." Sakura huffed at him but turned back to the fight.

"**CHIDORI (1000 Birds)!**" Sasuke yelled at the top of his lungs. Naruto just sighed and released the fingers on his outstretched fist into a normal open palm position. Sasuke smirked _'That fool thinks he can block Chidori with a simple open palm? I'll blow this idiots entire arm off!' _Just then Sasuke felt excrutiating pain all over his arms and upper back. "**Sutetchi: Shinda Ame (Stitching Art: Dead Rain)**" "AAUUUGH!" Sasuke screamed out as he saw dozens of sewing needles attatched to ninja wire sticking out of both his arms and felt even more in his back. The pain caused the Chidori to disperse and Sasuke to fall on his butt. "SASUKE-KUN!" Sakura called out yet again, much to the displeasure of Shinji who was standing right next to her. "Shut it Pinky, it isn't over yet" Naruto walked over to where Sasuke was sitting and crouched down to his level. "HOW? HOW DID A NO NAME LOSER LIKE YOU DO THIS TO ME?! AN UCHIHA! I'M THE ELITE!" Naruto sighed and looked Sasuke in the eye with indifference. "You made four mistakes today Uchiha-san. One, you repeatedly insulted my home after I gave you two separate warnings to stop. Two, you insilted my friend and disrespected someone who was and still is very precious to her. Three, you tried insulting my mother by calling her a derrogatory term, and say what you will about me, I don't enjoy it when someone insults my friends or family. And four..." Sasuke was seething now his arms were numb, his back was in pain, and he was forced to listen to someone talk down to him. "Four is..." Naruto continued "You charged me first, and made me your opponent." Naruto stood back up and walked to his team his team. A dumbfounded Sakura ran to Sasuke's side to try and help him.

"Oh, and one more thing Uchiha-san" Naruto said "You might want to look up." As he said that, he flicked his finger and lo and behold, a kunai suspended by ninja wire started falling directly down, targeting the crown of the Uchiha's skull. Sakura screamed and Sasuke eyes went wide when suddenly someone came out of nowhere and grabbed the kunai out of the air at the same time a shield made of hardened paper appeared above Sasuke's headand stopped it's descent. "K-kakashi-sensei" Sakura breathed out, relieved her crush was going to live another day. "Kaa-san" Naruto looked over his shoulder to see Konan recall her paper and form it back into her hand. "Yari, Yari." Kakashi said in a bored tone. "It seems our students got a little hot blooded. I must apologize, it seems Sasuke-kun here attacked first." "Please, there is no need to apologize Hatake Kakashi-san, my son should have known better then to fall for such taunts." She bowed her head and Kakashi did the same. "Do not worry Miss...?" "Konan" "Do not worry Konan-san, as long as he removes the needles I will not press charges." Naruto nodded and with a quick clench of his fist, all the needles were pulled out at the same time, then retracted into several holes in his gauntlets, disappearing like they were never there. "Excuse me Hatake-san" Naruto said "How fast do you think you could get to the nearest hospital" Kakashi thought for a moment and replied "About two minutes. Why do you ask?" "Well, in about three seconds-" Naruto was cut off by Sasuke screaming like a madman, a small fountain of blood spraying from every needle hole on his body." Kakashi and Sakura looked wide eyed while Shinji just started laughing like a crazed person exclaiming his love for the faces that always go across peoples faces during that part of the attack, and Haku just looked on indifferently. "You should probably hurry and get him to a hospital. He'll bleed out in about seven minutes."

Kakashi nodded and jumped off towards the hospital, with Sakura following after him. After they left, Konan turned to Naruto and gave him a glare that could make the toughest of men wet their pants "Why did you engage him in a battle! We could be kicked out of the exams before they even start! I understand he was insulting Oto but that was not reason to-" "He insulted Zabuza-san and called you a whore." Naruto interrupted. "I'm sorry Kaa-san, but I wasn't going to sit back and let him insult you and and disrespect Haku's father." Haku blushed and gave Naruto a grateful look, and he gave her a smile in return. Konan just looked at them both and sighed "Fine. Just do NOT let it happen again or else I'll report it to your father okay?" "Yes Kaa-san" Konan nodded then turned to both Shinji and Haku. "I want both of you to promise me to stay under control until the exams start alright?" "Yes, Konan-sama" they both replied and waited for her to Shunshin away.

As the trio prepared to continue their walk back to the hotel, Haku grabbed Naruto's hand, then leaned up on her tip-toes to give Naruto a quick kiss on the cheek Before taking a few steps forward and facing him, her face as red as a tomato "Thank you for defending Zabuza Naruto-kun" and with that she disappeared in an ice Shunshin. Shinji just started laughing "BAHAHAHAHAHA! YOUR FACE! IT'S AS RED AS AN APPLE RIGHT NOW! AHAHAHAHAHA!" Naruto just scowled at his friends antics "Be quiet Shinji" "HAHAHAHAHAHAHA! NARUTO AND HAKU SITTING IN A TREE, K-I-S-S-I-N-G!" his laughter redoubled when he finished and Naruto just rubbed his temples and kept walking.

* * *

**A/N: As a thank you to everyone who is showing my story so much attention already, I decided to upload this chapter early. How did you like the small scuffle between Naruto and Sasuke? Or the brief look into Naruto's skill set? There's a lot mroe where that came from so don't start thinking it's just going to be some waving of the hand and stuff happens. And yeah, I know it's a bit early for Sasuke to know Chidori right now, but still, it makes things easier later on.**

**Anyways, thanks for reading, reviews are appreciated!**


	3. Remembering the Past

**A/N: Hello everyone. Thanks for all the nice reviews and encouragement. It was really surprising! I didn't think I would be getting much attention seeing as how this is my first fic. Alright, anyways thanks again to everyone who reviewed, I'll be sure to keep it up! This chapter is Naruto's reunion with the people he made his promise to, a flashback to how he met Haku, and meeting a few other exam participants.**

"Talking"

_'thinking'_

**"Bijuu/Summon** **speech"**

**_'Bijuu/summon thoughts'_**

Written Report

* * *

**Chapter 2: Remembering the Past**

Hiruzen sighed. The time of the Chuunin exams always brings more paperwork than usual. Damn that Minato, heroically dying before his time. Paperwork was the entire reason he GAVE him the hat! Well, that and he was incredibly powerful. BUT MOSTLY THE PAPERWORK! He just wanted to take his retirement nice and lazily. But it seemed as soon as he walked into his house, lit his pipe and got his butt position _juuust_ right on his favorite sofa, the Kyuubi just HAD to rush in and ruin it all. Shaking his head of his thoughts, Hiruzen just glared at the stack of papers on his desk. _'Damn you paperwork, you foul beast! Now you have me badmouthing my Successor! You're lucky I don't burn you and put you and send you to paperwork hell while I dance on your stupid grave!'_ The hokage was broken out of his thoughts by a tap on the brim of his hat. Looking up he see's someone with spiky blonde hair and a big smile staring back at him. "You know Jiji" Naruto said while inspecting the stack of paperwork "why don't you just use Shadow Clones for this stuff? Seems like it'd be a whole lot easier." Sarutobi looked at Naruto, then back to the stack of papers then slammed his head on his desk "FORTY YEARS OF BEING HOKAGE AND I NEVER THOUGHT OF THAT?!" Naruto just laughed heartily at his surrogate grandfather's plight then took a chair and sat on the opposite side of the desk.

"So Jiji, how've you been these last seven years?" Naruto said while lifting his feet and putting them on the edge of the desk. Sarutobi looked him over for a second, taking in his appearance before responding "I have been quite well. Well, besides the paperwork" he chuckled a bit before continuing "The bigger question is, how have YOU been my boy? It's been so long I was beginning to think you forgot about me." Naruto laughed "Oh come on Jiji, I promised you I'd come to visit right? Yeah it took a while but between travelling and helping Tou-san, Kaa-san and Oji-san set up Oto, I never had the time." the sandaime nodded in understanding. "Besides." Naruto continued "I'm sure the council wouldn't like to know that I was still alive in another village this entire time. I know they'll be forced to see me during the final stage of the exams, but that's the beauty of it. I want them to see just how much of an asset I could have been while I kick their genin around the arena." Hiruzen laughed. "I see, I see. So that's why Konan-san came to me asking to hide your entry until the last minute. It's a very good idea." Naruto nodded "Yep. And to make sure nobody notices me, I stick to the rooftops over side streets when I travel and placed a low level genjutsu on myself so no civilians can tell what I look like. Although anyone that has at least Genin level reserves will still be able to see through it if they pay attention."

Naruto stood up and walked towards the window behind the hokage's desk "Well, I have to go Jiji. Still have to visit Teuchi-ojisan and Ayame-nee." Hiruzen took out his pipe and lit it up before inhaling and blowing out the smoke "Very well Naruto-kun. Good luck during the exams." When Sarutobi turned around, he got a good look at Naruto's back, seeing the part of his cloak cut off from the back revealing his 'DEMON' scar. "Naruto wait!" "Hmm?" Naruto turned around "What is it?" "Your scar. Why are you displaying it so openly? I thought you'd be ashamed of it." Naruto smiled widely and said "NOPE! It's a reminder of why I should get stronger. So nothing that bad can ever happen to me or anyone else I care for." Turning back to the window, Naruto was preparing to just out again "And besides, it got me a pretty badass name in the bingo book!" "B-BINGO BOOK?! BUT HOW-" Naruto jumped out of the office towards the town "Just wait for the updated one, you'll see! Oh, and tell your ANBU to keep our conversation a secret! I want to see the look on the councils faces when they find out I'm alive!" and with that he was gone. The ANBU shifted a little in the shadows seeing as how they were noticed by a genin, but resumed their positions once they got a hold of themselves. "That kid. No matter where he goes he always gets himself into trouble" Sarutobi chuckled before making shadow clones to do his paperwork then pulling out an orange book from underneath his desk and sighing contentedly. Oh yeah, he could get used to this.

* * *

Making a quick stop at the hotel to pick up Shinji and Haku, the trio walked towards what Naruto called 'The greatest restaurant in Konoha'. Shinji was excited. Naruto was a black hole when it came to food. If he said it was the greatest place to eat, then it was the greatest place to eat. Plus, Konoha was his home village, so there's no way he wouldn't know, right? Haku was just walking next to Naruto who seemed too excited to make small talk. _'I wonder if it's a fancy restaurant' _Haku thought. _'Maybe we can come back to it if we ever go on a date' _Haku giggled a bit at her thought but was brought out of them by Naruto "Here we are!" he said excitedly. He walked into a small ramen stand that only had 4 stools and sat down. a disappointed Haku and Shinji following his lead.

"Hey Oji-san! Get mme one of everything on the menu!" Teuchi responded "Coming right up! You know nobody has made such a big order or called me Oji-san since-" As he turned around, he saw Naruto with a huge grin "N-NARUTO?! IS IT REALLY YOU?!" "The one and only! It's been some time hasn't it Oji-san!" Teuchi just laughed "Well I'll be! Hey Ayame!" he called out to the back "Come here! We got a surprise visitor!" A feminine voice called back "Who is it this time?!" "Come and see for yourself!" Teuchi laughed back. A girl with long brown hair in twin braids and wearing a white apron came to the front of the restaurant looking over Haku and Shinji before setting here gaze on Naruto. "Ayame-nee! Good to see you!" Ayame teared up a little before running over and pulling Naruto into a hug over the counter, pushing his face into her... assets. "NARUTO! IT'S BEEN TOO LONG! WHY DIDN''T YOU COME BACK SOONER!" she exclaimed as Naruto was trying to escape the hug, lest he suffocate in his soft prison.

"Woah-ho-ho, It seems Leader-san works fast, eh Haku? Better step your game up before you lost him" Shinji snickered. Upon hearing this, Haku blushed and punched Shinji in the shoulder, then looked down at her own chest before sighing. Noting her reaction, Ayame let go of Naruto before looking at them and saying "Hehe... Sorry, it's just Naruto was like a little brother to me. I haven't seen him in seven years!" Teuchi came back to the counter and handed Shinji and Haku menus "Order whatever you like! Seeing as how this is a reunion, everything is on the house today!" Naruto cheered. "Oi old man, you sure about that? Naruto will eat you out of house and home then ask for seconds" Shinji said pointing his thumb at Naruto. "Oh Shut up Shin-kun, He offered! And I don't want to be rude by turning him down!" Teuchi set down 3 bowls of Miso ramen and Naruto dug in with gusto.

Three hours later, Naruto was passed out on the counter with a content look on his face while surrounded by a mountain of empty bowls that could rival the amount of paperwork the Hokage had to do on his busiest day. He actually ate so much, Teuchi was forced to close up shop for the day. Haku had eaten two bowls and Shinji six. "So, Now that little Naru-kun is asleep" Ayame said while turning to Haku "How did you two meet? It's obvious that you have a crush on him." "Hey yeah" Shinji said "Now that you mention it, I only know bits and pieces of the story too, and that's only because I overheard stuff." Haku looked at them both then looked at Naruto's sleeping face and smiled. Well you see, It happened about 7 months ago...

* * *

**FLASHBACK**

"Haku." Zabuza said in his gruff voice. "Take the genin. Make sure they don't leave this bridge alive." Zabuza was a tall man with pale grayish skin and really short black spiky hair. He was wearing baggy pants with a stripe pattern, leg and arm warmers that had a cow pattern on them, and no shirt, exposing his muscles. Strapped to his back was the legendary zanbato, Kubikiribocho and his Kirigakure hitai-ate was faceing sideways on his head with a slash running through it, signifying he was a missing-nin. "Hai, Zabuza-sama." Haku hated to kill, but it was her orders. Still, she was frowning behind her fake Kirigakure hunter mask In front of her were Team 7 from Konoha. Hatake Kakashi with his Sharingan eye already revealed, Uchiha Sasuke looking smug as ever, Haruno Sakura looking like she was about to faint from fear, and a pale boy with black hair with a fake smile named Sai. Kakashi and Zabuza rushed forward, disappearing into the mist while sparks from the clash of Zabuza's sword and Kakashi's kunai were flying everywhere. Once they were out of sight, Haku turned to her targets.

"I am truly sorry for this" She said in an apologetic tone. "It is nothing personal. I understand you have a mission to complete, but I have my mission as well. I am Zabuza-sama's tool, and as such I must do what he says." Sasuke smirked at her "Oh please, you have no idea who you're dealing with. My name is Uchiha Sasuke. Remember it in the afterlife!" Sasuke charged forward while Sakura cheered him on and Sai just looked on impassively. "GET READY TO DIE-" Sasuke started to shout, but Haku moved at speeds he couldn't see and grabbed his face with her hands. "W-what the-?!" was all Sasuke could get out before Haku slammed the back his head into the bridge at full strength, knocking him unconscious and making a small crater in the process. "N-NO!" Sakura shouted out "T-THAT'S IMPOSSIBLE! SASUKE-KUN WAS THE STRONGEST ON OUR TEAM! HOW COULD HE-" Sakura was also cut off when several senbon needles were thrown into several pressure points on her arms and legs, making her unable to stand. Before she hit the ground, Haku sped behind her and pressed a pressure point on the base of her neck, knocking her uncocious as well. She turned to her last target who looked on, slightly impressed.

"Well, Fake Hunter-san" Sai said in an unemotional voice. "You exceeded my expectations by knocking out Dickless and Ugly so fast." Haku bowed slightly. "Thank you Konoha-san" "Please, just call me Sai. It's the least I can do to repay you for knocking them out. Now I can reveal my skills with no restrictions or questions later." And with that, the battle began. At first, Haku thought he was gloating or bluffing about his power, but she soon came to notice that Sai was way about genin level. They were about even in strength. Haku had used up almost all her chakra in that fight by maintaining her **Hyoton: Makyo Hyosho (Ice Release: Demonic Ice Mirrors)**but in the end, she won. Haku was about to sit down to catch her breath when she heard a strange noise. It sounded almost like... birds. _'Oh no!' _she thought _'Zabuza-sama!' _She started rushing to his side, seeing him being pinned by several summoned dogs, unable to move and his opponent charging a mass of lightning chakra in his hands. Kakashi rushed forward, his attack aimed at Zabuza's torso. "ZABUZA-SAMA!" Haku tried to run as fast as she could, she had to intercept. Even at the cost of her own life, she had to save him!

Suddenly, something caught her ankle and she tripped. Looking down she saw a now conscious, albeit a little groggy, Sasuke holding on to her leg. "Y-you're not going anywhere!" he panted. Haku kicked his arm off and was about to continue running when the sound of pierced flesh and Zabuza's yell rang through the air. Looking back at him, Haku saw Zabuza convulsing on the ground, lighting chakra still running through his system. Kakashi had also fainted from chakra exhaustion, but not before muttering "You were a worthy opponent... Zabuza-san" Haku watched as her mentor, her savior, her father figure was on the ground dying. She fell on her knees where she stood, tears streaming out of her eyes. She didn't notice Sasuke standing up, and she didn't care when he turned her around and kneed her mask off of her face. "So you were a girl huh?" Sasuke said emotionlessly. "Whatever. I'll send you to join your master in the afterlife!" Haku watched lifelessly as Sasuke's kunai was nearing her throat. She didn't care. The one person that she cared for was dead. At least now they could be together forever. When Sasuke's kunai was an inch from her throat, someone else arrived, grabbed his arm, and before anyone could register what was going on, Sasuke was kicked across the bridge and once again lost consciousness as he slammed into the metal railing.

Haku didn't know and didn't care about who just saved her. She got back up and ran to Zabuza, kneeling down at his side. "H... Haku" Zabuza said weakly. "Haku... I don't have much time left..." He coughed up a bit of blood, staining the bandages wrapped around his mouth red. "Don't talk Zabuza-sama! I can save you! You can still-" "Haku... Stop." Zabuza's breathing was getting labored he coughed up a bit more blood before turning back to her. "Listen to me Haku. This is my last order to you... Don't go down the path I did. Don't travel the road of blood. You are young... and pure. You can do anything you want in life... So live. Live for me..." Zabuza's breathing started to slow as Haku started crying even more. "H-hey... Kid" Haku turned around to see a blonde boy with blue eyes and whisker marks on his face. His expression showed that even though he didn't know what was going on, he was just as sad as she was. Zabuza continued "I don't know who you are... But I don't sense any ill intent from you... P-please... pro... protect Haku. She is... my... daughter... promise me this... please." The blonde boy nodded and replued "I promise you" Zabuza smiled one last time... and with that he passed.

Before Haku could break down and start crying, a clapping noise could be heard. Haku and Naruto turned around to see the crime lord and businessman Gato along with a hundred thugs and bandits armed to the teeth with various weapons. "Well now!" Gato said in a smug voice "It seemed everything worked out just fine! This result is better than I could have hoped for!" he laughed. "Zabuza is dead, you two and the Konoha ninja will be killed here, and I'll hold a public execution for the bridge builder! Kami must be smiling on me today!" Haku was absolutely livid. This man was insulting Zabuza even after death, and he was planning to betray them from the start! She stood up a bit shakily, getting ready to charge Gato and his thugs when she was held back by the blonde boy. "Don't." he said in a voice that barely disguised his anger. "WHY NOT?! HE INSULTED ZABUZA-SAMA! HE SET US UP! PLANNED ON KILLING US! WHY ARE YOU STOPPING ME FROM GOING OVER THERE AND KILLING HIM?!" "BECAUSE I MADE A PROMISE TO KEEP YOU ALIVE! I MAY NOT KNOW WHO YOU ARE, OR WHY YOU'RE IN THIS POSITION, BUT I PROMISED ZABUZA-SAN THAT I WOULD KEEP YOU ALIVE! I'M NOT GOING TO SIT HERE AND LET YOU CHARGE TO YOUR DEATH! I NEVER GO BACK ON MY WORD, SO SIT DOWN AND REST WHILE I HANDLE THIS!"

Haku was shocked to say the least. This boy she didn't even know was actually going to follow through with his promise? She thought he just agreed to help Zabuza pass with no regrets. But the look in his eyes just now said that he was going to keep his promise for as long as he lived. So she just nodded and sat next to Zabuza's body while the newcomer materialized strange looking gauntlets from seals on his wrists. She watched as he moved both his hands in an intricate pattern, mesmerized by the dexterity of his fingers. Gato and his men just laughed. Who was this brat that thought he could beat over 100 men by just flailing his hand in random directions? When the boy stopped Gato spoke up. "Are you done with your little show? Yes? Well then, ATTACK!" Gato's army let out a battle cry and charged, getting a little confused when Naruto turned around and started walking back towards Haku normally.

"What are you doing?!" Haku exclaimed. "They're coming!" Naruto just looked at her confusedly and tilted his head. "What do you mean Haku-san?" He pulled both of his gauntlets forward and she noticed an almost invisible wire coming from the tips of the clawed fingers. All of Gato's men were surprised when a net of ninja wire seemingly came out of nowhere and caught all 100 of them. "They're already dead." Naruto continued. "**Sutetchi: Muki Netto (Stitching Art: Inorganic Net)**" Lightning chakra ran through the net, electricuting everyone trapped inside and didn't stop until smoke started rising from their bodies. Haku was dumbfounded. Who was this guy? How the hell did he kill so many thugs in one attack? "Oh, I almost forgot!" Naruto flicked his little finger and wire wrapped around Gato's throat. "You don't mind if I'm the one that kills him, right Haku-san?" Naruto said with a bored look on his face. Haku just shook her head no and Naruto pulled his little finger back, causing the wire to cut off the choking Gato's head.

Haku turned back to Zabuza with a sad expression on her face. What was she going to do now? Where was she going to go? While contemplating she was picked up bridal style by Naruto. "W-what are you doing?!" she asked while blushing "I smell a crowd of civilians coming. It would be bad if they found us here, dont you think?" Naruto said with a grin. He jumped off the bridge and ran atop the water towards the mainland. "Where are we going?" Haku asked. "My Tou-san should be in the next town. We were on a mission when I descided to check out what all the commotion was on the bridge. One I explain the situation to him, he'll be more than happy make sure you can have a place to live in our village. After all, it was built on the hopes and dreams of people who have nowhere else to go. You'll fit right in." Haku nodded and asked "What is the name of this village?" Naruto just smiled at her and said "Otogakure"

**Flashback End**

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"Wow" Shinji said at the end of her tale. "Leader can be a really cool guy sometimes. didn't know he had in in him." Ayame and Teuchi just nodded and wiped tears out of their eyes. "YOOOOOOSH!" a new voice said startling Haku. "I DO NOT KNOW WHO THIS MAN IS, BUT HIS FLAMES OF YOUR SHINE BRIGHTLY!" Haku turned around to find nine leaf genin behind her, who were listening to her story. Seeing her confused face, Shinji decided to explain "These guys were drawn in to your story. been listening since the part where Leader-san came in. "INDEED HAKU-SAN! WHERE IS THIS SAVIOR OF YOURS WHOSE YOUTH BURNS SO BRIGHTLY?!" A boy with a bowl cut wearing geen spandex shouted loudly. "Yeah, I bet he's a total hottie" said a girl in a purple outfit with long platnum blonde hair. "I want to see his weapons! They sound so cool!" Said a girl in a pink chinese styled shirt who looked kind of like a panda. "How troublesome." a lazy looking boy with a pineapple-like hairdo drawled out. "Killed 100 guys? Please you must be exaggerating! I'm the strongest there is! I bet I could kick this guys ass!" a wild looking boy exclaimed while his little white dog just yipped in agreement. "H-he sounds so cool..." a girl with milky white eyes stuttered out. A boy with similar eyes and another boy wearing dark sunglasses just stayed quiet and the last one, a round boy just nodded while eating his potato chips"

"So where is this guy?" The blonde girl said, the rest of them nodding in agreement. "Who? Leader-san? He's right over there." Shinji replied pointed back to Naruto. Everyone eagerly turned to get a look at him and they were sorely disappointed. What they saw was a snoring Naruto with Ramen broth and a few small pieces of noodles all around his mouth, and his shinobi pants unzipped slightly so his swollen stomach could get some air. "W-what the hell?" The kid with the dog exclaimed. "THERE'S NO WAY THIS GUY COULD'VE DONE ALL THAT! HE LOOKS LIKE HE ATE HIMSELF INTO A COMA!" as if on cue, Naruto burped really loudly, let out a huge fart, and stirred in his sleep, his eyelids flickered open to see his Haku face palming, Shinji laughing at him and a group of Konoha genin staring at him incredulously. He wiped his face before tilting his head. "Huh? Did I miss something?"

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**A/N: Well, there you go. Even though this was mostly just a fluff chapter, I tried to make it as interesting as possible. I introduced all of the other leaf genin near the end of the chapter because I didn't want to have to do it all spread out throughout the next ones. How did you like Haku and Naruto's meeting? It was kind of hard to write since im still new to writing emotional stuff. Naruto's main element is still Wind, but he learned to manipulate Lightning and Water elements too. And before anyone asks, yes, the Inorganic Net attack was a reference to Air Gear. I might start referencing some of my other favorite anime in some other attacks from now on. Anyways, next time we timeskip to the day of the first test! See you then! Thanks for reading and reviews are appreciated**


	4. First Test

**A/N: Hey everyone, sorry about the delay in updates. My power went out for about 3 days straight and the chapter I was working on kind of got deleted before I could save it, so I had to start from scratch. And to make matters worse, my school had standardized testing all week so that kind of killed my mood to write. From now on I'll try to release at least one or two chapters a week.**

***ahem***

**This chapter introduces the second genin team from Oto and lazily goes through the first exam, since it's the one I personally find the most boring. I also kind of doubles as Shinji's talkative chapter, since he's an OC I want you guys to get as much of his personality as possible as quickly as possible so I won't have to slow down later with it. Plus you all know how Haku is so there isn't really any need to go into her too much at this time, and Naruto is still Naruto, just not as loud with people he doesn't know.**

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**Chapter 3: First Test**

The rest of the time before the Chuunin exams passed relatively quickly. After the events at Ichiraku, Naruto, Shinji, and Haku met all the participating teams from Konoha, and thanks to Naruto's *ahem* rather vulgar first impression and Shinji's loudmouth tendencies, got the other teams to believe that they were about average in terms of skill. Exactly what they wanted. About three days before the exam, the other Oto team arrived. This team was composed of two boys and a girl had Nagato as a jounin sensei

The first member was a platinum blonde boy named Arno. He had flat hair that went down to around the bottom of his neck and spiked slightly on the left side. He wore a long sleeved white shirt with a black vest with a tornado design on the back over it, fingerless white gloves, black shinobi pants, and black sandals. He wore his his Oto hitai-ate around his neck.

The second member was a girl with tanned skin, spiky mint green hair adorned with an orange clip, and vibrant orange eyes named Fuu. She wore a short sleeveless white shirt the cut off at her stomach, and had fishnet armor underneath. On her arms were long white armlets, and she had fishnet shorts with a short white apron skirt over it. She had two hitae-ate, one was on her right arm that had the symbol for Takigakure and an Oto symbol in the middle of the arrow, while the other was on her left arm and had the kanji for the number "Seven".

The last member was a blue haired boy wearing glasses named Chojuro. He wears a blue pin-striped shirt and camouflage pattern pants. On top of his shirt a black holster that is used to carry a dual hilted bandaged sword (that looked suspiciously like a flounder). His hitae-ate was on his holster and had the symbol for Kirigakure with the Oto symbol in between the four lines. These three were being led by their jounin sensei, Nagato.

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On the day of the exam, both teams met up outside of the academy for the first exam. The Oto genin were conversing with each other behind Naruto who was leading the group. Shinji noticed Naruto being strangely quiet for some reason, so he decided to confront him about it. "Oi, Leader-san, you're not getting cold feet now are ya?" Shinji asked. "C'mon we need you focused so we can win this thing!" "Indeed." Arno added "I agree with Shinji-dono. We need you to be focused at the task at hand Naruto-sama. If the son of the Shodai Otokage fails early on, it will make the rest of our country, by terms of association, look weak." Naturo just shook his head and looked up at the academy building. "It's not that i'm nervous... it's just... I always used to want to come inside here when I was a kid. I always saw it as the first step to becoming Hokage. Heh, I guess seeing it is just kind of nostalgic." he looked at the building and smiled a bit. "Anyway, enough of that. Let's go inside and kick this test's ass!" A resounding cheer sounded from everyone but Arno, (who just settled on a small smile and a nod) before they all walked inside.

Once inside the academy, they went up to the second floor before noticing a large crowd had gathered. Two individuals were keeping the rest of the group from entering what they claimed to be the test room, although the Oto group quickly saw through the genjutsu that was placed on the floor that changed the room numbers. The crowd was was begging to get in and the two blocking the door, and a Naruto, Shinji and Haku noticed that a boy who was doubled over on the ground, seemingly injured was in fact Rock Lee, one of the konoha genin they met the other day. They assumed Lee was hiding his strength as even with is eccentricities he didn't come across as weak, so they decided not to blo.w his cover by calling him out on it. As the Oto nin walked past the group, the two that were guarding the door was telling the crowd about the dangers of the chuunin exam and that they should quit. "Idiots" Fuu whispered. "They can't even see though a simple genjutsu. they don't deserve to take these exams if something as simple as this trips them up." the rest of the group just nodded and continued past. Just as they were about to head up the stairs, a voice rang out.

"Hey you. Get out of my way and get rid of the genjutsu. You should know better than to think suck a cheap trick would actually work." Looking over, the Oto group saw Uchiha Sasuke along with the rest of his team confronting the two boys that were stopping the crowd. Said crowd was muttering in confusion about what Sasuke had said "Sasuke-kun is right!" Sakura said "This is only the second floor!" Needless to say, the genin that were being held back were all outraged. Sasuke smirked and began to speak again when he was cut off "Hey, Uchiha, are you an idiot?" growling, Sasuke looked to the source of the voice, revealing it to be none other than Naruto. "The genjutsu was placed to weed out the weak before the exams started. If you would have kept your mouth shut, those two henged proctors over there would have kept all the bottom tier ones from making it on time and thinned out the competition. You have such a big mouth" the crowd of genin laughed as Naruto continued "You know, if you were as elite as you think you were you would have seen this and kept your damned mouth shut. Everyone and their grandmothers will be up there now." the rest of the Oto genin snickered while Sasuke seethed at being humiliated in front of a crowd. Naruto and his crew then continued up the stairs towards the exam room.

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Walking into the exam room, both Oto teams went towards the back and immediately started scoping out the competition. Some of the other teams tried to intimidate them with some meager attempt at killing intent, but they just shook it off without any trouble. Upon coming across a team from Suna though, everyone got bad vibes. "Naruto-kun" Fuu whispered "The short kid on the Suna team with the red hair and gourd... You don't think..." "Yeah." Naruto whispered back. "I feel it too. He's like us." The short redheaded kid looked at both of them, then walked over. "You two." he said looking at both Naruto and Fuu and gaining the attention of the rest of the Oto genin. "I don't know who you are... But Mother is calling for your blood. She feels something strange about you. She is calling me... telling me to kill you both. You will both become Mother's next meal" Naruto just snorted "Nice to meet you too, Suna-san. Any particular reason you're calling us out before the exams even start?" The red haired boy just looked at them both before saying "My name is Sabaku no Gaara. Remember it. It will be the name of your murderer." and he walked back to his team. Fuu watched him walk away before looking back at Naruto who just shrugged.

At that moment, Sakura, Sai and Sasuke (who looked a little bruised) walk in, who upon immediately spotting Naruto's team tries to confront him. "Hey you there. Blondie" Sasuke said trying to get a reaction out of him. Naruto looked around then nudged Arno in the elbow. "Psst, hey Arno-kun, I think he's talking to you." getting a round of snickers out of the Oto nin and causing Sasuke to get angry. "DON'T IGNORE ME LOSER!" "Alright, alright." Naruto said while sighing "What do you want Uchiha?" Sasuke walked in closer, trying to intimidate him "Don't think just because you got in a cheap shot the other day means you're better than me. I didn't even have my sharingan activated. You and your trash friends from your backwater village don't stand a chance against me in a normal match. I am-" "I am the Elite! I am an Uchiha! I AM... A whiny emo boy with a duck ass haircut and an inferiority complex." Naruto interrupted while mocking Sasuke by changing his voice into a whinier version of Sasuke's causing both Oto teams and a few of the surrounding teams into a fit of laughter. "You know, if I weren't such a nice guy I'd kick your ass again just for being so annoying." Needless to say, Sasuke was pissed as he stormed off with Sakura in tow screeching like a harpy about how Naruto would pay for talking to "her precious Sasuke-kun" like that. "Well, I must say" Sai spoke up catching Naruto's attention "You certainly have dickless over there pegged." Naruto just shrugged "Of course. Arrogant idiots like him are a dime a dozen." Sai just nodded and gave an extremely fake looking smile before returning to his team, who was now conversing with a white haired genin from Konoha. Naruto was about to turn his attention back to his friends when he heard Sasuke speak his villages name.

"Sabaku no Gaara, Rock Lee, and any information you have on any of the Oto nin. When the reast of the Oto genin heard this, they stopped talking started listening. "Aww, you know their names already? That's no fun." the white haired boy said before picking out a card from a deck and channeling chakra into it. "Sabaku no Gaara, genin from Sunagakure. There's almost nothing known about his abilities. 47 D ranks completed, 7 C ranks, 2 B ranks and oh wow, even an A rank! His teammates are his siblings Sabaku no Temari and Sabaku no Kankuro" the boy said "It also says that he came back from every mission without a scratch on him." Naruto raised an eyebrow filed that bit of information away for later. The genin put his card away and pulled out a second one. "Rock Lee, genin from Konohagakure. 52 D ranks, 4 C ranks, and 1 B ranks completed. It says here that he has no ability in Ninjutsu or Genjutsu, but his Taijutsu is off the charts! He is teamed with Neji of the Hyuuga clan and a girl from a civilian family named Tenten."

Once again, the boy put his card away. As he pulled out the third one, Shinji walked up to them and grabbed it along with the entire deck, wrenching it out of the silver haired boys hands. . "Sorry kiddies, but apparently, unlike everyone else who just had their cards read, we Oto-nin like to keep our skills on a need to know basis." Sasuke smirked and responded "What's the matter Oto trash? You afraid everyone will know how much you actually suck?" Shinji returned the smirk full force before saying "What are you talking about Uchiha-san? You should know how good we are first hand! If memory serves you got messed up pretty bad by Leader-san over there a few days ago. I'm actually surprised to see you're out of the hospital so quickly." Shinji then turned his head to Naruto and saying "Oi Leader-san! You must be losing your touch!" Naruto looked back with a amused face. "Nah, I just thought that the look on his face before my attack hit was priceless. I decided to hold back a bit so he would recover in time for the exam just so I could do it again. I'll have to make sure to take a picture next time." Shinji looked back at Sasuke who's face was contorted with anger. "Well, there you have it. I wonder if he'll make copies..."

Before Shinji could get lost in his thoughts, the boy who had his cards taken away tapped him on the shoulder. "Umm... excuse me Oto-san, my name is Yakushi Kabuto. If you it isn't any trouble, would you mind giving me my cards back? They're kind of important..." Shinji looked at the now identified Kabuto then back at the deck of cards before saying "No" and making them burst into flames, leaving everyone who was paying close enough attention to wonder how he created fire without any hand seals. Shinji walked back to his group and a large explosion of smoke appeared in the front of the room.

"ALRIGHT YOU MAGGOTS, SIT DOWN AND SHUT UP!" A tall man with a scarred face blasted the entire room with killing intent, making some of the weaker genin tremble. "MY NAME IS IBIKI MORINO, AND I WILL BE YOUR PROCTOR FOR THE FIRST EXAM!" Ibiki said in a no nonsense tone. "FIRST UP WILL BE A WRITTEN TEST! ALL OF YOU FRONT AND CENTER. ONCE ALL OF YOU LITTLE SHIT STAINS HAVE YOUR TEST SHEET'S I'LL EXPLAIN THE RULES." Everybody lined up quickly and got their test, then went back to their seat, not making a peep so the extremely scary man wouldn't turn his attention to them. After he explained the rules of the first exam, (**A/N: you should all know them by now so I won't bother explaining them.**) everybody got started.

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Naruto quickly got the point of the test, and used is above average hearing to listen to the person in front of him and copied his answers by listening to the way their pencil was being dragged along the paper. After he finished answering his questions, Naruto helped out Fuu, who was sitting on his left by discreetly tapping his sandal against hers in a morse code pattern. Seeing that she was also done, Naruto decided to check on his other comrades.

Arno was doing fine. He seemed to be answering the questions without any need to cheat at all. _'He always was a brainiac' _Naruto thought to himself before looking over at Haku. Me noticed her using an mirror made of ice to copy off of Arno, who was in front of her, and at the same time allowing Chojuro, who was next to her, to copy off of her. Alright, that's most of them down. Now to check on "YOU THERE, WHY ARE YOU NOT DOING ANYTHING!" Ibiki yelled out. _'Oh man. Please don't be who I think it is.' _Sure enough, looking over Naruto saw Shinji leaning back with his chair on it's back legs resting his geta on the desk, hands behind his head, and his uncovered eye closed. _'GOD DAMN IT SHINJI!' _Naruto exclaimed internally.

Shinji just sighed, mumbled something about boring written tests and how he just wanted to punch something as he picked up his pencil, and began working. After 45 minutes passed and many teams were kicked out for being caught cheating too many times, Ibiki spoke up again, explaining the rules of the tenth question. As most of the room went in outrage, many teams left due to the pressure. When nobody else got up, Ibiki explained that they all passed and started to explain the purpose of the tenth question to the confused genin. While in the middle of the explanation, Shinji spoke up, having returned to the same sitting position as earlier "Come on already, just get on with it! I want to get to the next test so I can _hopefully_ hit something." Ibiki, having had enough of Shinji's behavior, decided to make an example out of him before the next proctor arrived.

Walking up to Shinji's desk, he slammed his hand on it, making small cracks on it when he did so. "What was that, brat?" Ibiki said in a dangerous tone of voice while leaking killer intent and glaring at the Oto nin. Shinji returned his chair to a normal position and returned the glare full force along with a slightly arrogant smirk, and was about to say something when a black object broke through a window and exploded, revealing a giant banner that said "THE SEXY AND SINGLE MITARASHI ANKO HAS ARRIVED!" that was then pinned to the wall by two kunai. Then, someone jumped though a second unbroken window (breaking it in the process of jumping through) and landed in the front of the room.

The new arrival was a woman with purple hair tied in a spiky ponytail wearing a full body mesh suit, a tan trench coat, and an incredibly short burnt orange miniskirt along with metal bracers on both of her legs. She struck a slightly weird post an shouted "THE SECOND PROCTOR, MITARASHI ANKO-SAMA HAS ARRIVED!" Looking around the room and seeing the confused looks and the reaction (or lack thereof) of the genin, she started to frown, until she came across Shinji and Naruto who had both wrote "9/10" on the back of their test sheets. "Oh come on!" Anko complained. "Only a 9? I put hard work into that entrance!" Naruto took a thoughtful pose and said "Well, Mitarashi-san, it wasn't that your entrance wasnt impressive... it was nearly perfect. It just felt like it was missing something... Maybe make the banner pop out more? Brighter colors and maybe instead of just 'The Sexy and Single Mitarashi Anko' you could add something on... maybe 'The Sexy, Single, and Mysterious Mitarashi Anko', or something similar." "Also, it needs more fire in my opinion." Shinji added on. "Maybe some firecrackers or roman candles would do the trick... maybe go the whole nine yards and just use some low-grade explosives."

Upon hearing this, Anko broke into a huge grin and said "You know what? You two are alright! I'll make sure to make the changes!" Naruto and Shinji just smiled and nodded while the rest of the room sweatdropped. Turning to the rest of the remaining genin, the second proctor yelled out "ALRIGHT KIDDIES, FOLLOW ME TO TRAINING GROUND 44! IT'S TIME TO GO TO HELL ON EARTH AND BEAT THE CRAP OUT OF EACH OTHER!" "ALRIGHT!" Shinji exclaimed "IT'S ABOUT DAMN TIME!" as the other genin in the room got out of their seats and filed to the door, Anko then proceeded to run and jump out of the only other unbroken window in the room, completely shattering it like the other two. Ibiki sighed and Shinji laughed. "I LIKE THIS CHICK!" he then proceeded to cock back his fist and punched a hole in the wall that he jumped through to chase after Anko, surprising the other genin still left in the room.

Naruto sighed. "Come on guys, Shinji's gotten too excited again. I was wondering when it would happen, he was sitting still for far too long." he then turned to Ibiki "Sorry Morino-san. When Shinji sits still for too long he tends to forward all of the extra energy towards excitement for his next fight. You can send the repair bill to the Otokage, he should be able to pay for the damages." Naruto sighed again before walking up to the hole his teammate left. "Come on guys, we better catch up to him and calm him down before he starts toppling buildings." The rest of the group nodded and one by one they all lept out of the hole and followed their comrade.

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**A/N: Well, there it is. I know this chapter was boring and stuff but I kind of don't really like the first exam scenarios in the canon or in most fics (unless it's changed to something else entirely). A lot of you have PM'ed me asking why Shinji is always so loud and I thought I'd explain a bit here, and more in the preliminaries and/or Forest of Death. He is kind of like canon young Naruto, he has too much energy to sit in one place for too long or he'll get bored. Except instead of being loud and complaining like youg naruto., Shinji will deal with having to sit still and be quiet as long as it's important, (like a mission briefing, etc) and divert all of the pent up energy into everything he does the next time he's allowed to move as he wants to again. Think of it as damming off a river so it builds up then removing the dam, releasing all the water. There will be a lot more than usual until the river flows like normal again.**

**As always, thanks for reading and reviewing. If you have any questions, don't hesitate to ask!**


	5. Forest of Death

**A/N: Once again, I'm sorry about the delay of this chapter. In here we have some fighting in the forest of death to show off some of the Oto groups skills and abilities. I don't want everyone to thing that the Stitching arts is all Naruto has after all. I'm also working on re-writing the first four chapters so be sure to check those out from time to time.**

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**Chapter 5: Forest of Death**

"Welcome, fresh meat, to Training Ground 44! Or as we oh-so affectionately call it here in Konoha, The Forest of Death!" The second proctor stated as she made a grand motion to the fenced off forest behind her. "And let me tell you, it deserves every little bit of it's name. In here is where the second test will take place, and let me tell you, It's guaranteed that the amount of teams will be cut in half."

"OOH OOH! OVER HERE PROCTOR-SAN!" Shinji yelled excitedly as he waved his hand frantically in the air "I HAVE A QUESTION! PICK ME, PICK ME!" The other genin gave him an incredulous look. He looked like a little kid in a kindergarten class!

"Yeah, what is it gaki?" Anko replied

"Will we be able to literally cut people in half?" Shinji asked with a serious face, unnerving some of the other chunin hopefuls "Please tell me we will. After that boring ass written exam, I need to hit something _sooooooo_ bad. Like, _REALLY, REALLY _bad."

Naruto sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose. "Sorry about him proctor-san, he get's a little overexcited if he sits still for too long and-" they blonde boy started to explain when he suddenly heard a kunai whiz past his head. A small cut opened up on his cheek, which started bleeding and he felt two soft mounds being pushed against his back

"Oh, I don't mind" Anko said as she leaned forward and began to lick the blood off of Naruto's cheek. "Mmmmm, Your blood is really sweet gaki." Anko suddenly stopped when she felt a tongue against her cheek as well. "Yours isnt so bad either... proctor-san."

Anko pulled back and touched her face to see a opened cut on her cheek. And to top it all off, he had licked the blood from it as well. _'What the hell? I didn't even see the kid move, let alone feel him cut my cheek. Heh, he's an interesting one.'_ she thought to herself. She glanced around to see that the other Oto genin were looking bored, except for Chojuro who was blushing and Fu and Haku who looked slightly off put by the exchange. The genin from Konoha and other villages still had the incredulous looks of their faces, save for a few of the more stoic ones.

"Well you're a cheeky one aren't you? I can't wait to see you splattered all over the forest floor."

Naruto smirked and chuckled. "Heh, I try. Now I believe you were explaining the rules to the second exam?" Anko nodded and went into the rules, saying that they were to be given one type of scroll and to gather the opposite one by stealing it from the other teams. After getting their scrolls and signing waivers saying that Konoha wouldn't be held responsible for any deaths, the Otogakure teams gathered together to make a strategy before the test began.

"Anyone have any ideas on how to go about this?" Naruto asked.

"I believe I have an idea Naruto-sama." Arno said, drawing everyone's attention. "Our starting gates aren't too far apart, only about an hour away if both teams move at top speed. I believe it would be easier to meet up near the gate after the test starts and overwhelm any teams we come across. Since we both have Earth scrolls, we will need two Heaven scrolls, but I feel that if we run into any teams even after we have our two scrolls, we should dispose of them. Thinning down the competition should help."

Naruto nodded, it was a solid enough plan. "Good idea Arno-kun. I want you to be the leader of your team until we meet up."

"Hai, Naruto-sama." Arno replied

"Chojuro, I need you to be in the middle of your formation. With Hiramekarei, you're the teams heavy hitter."

"H-hai, taichou" Chojuro stuttered out. "I-i'll do my best."

"You'll do fine, so don't worry. Anyway, Fu-chan will cover the rear, your dragonflies will be able to watch your backs. We'll set up a new formation once we all meet up." Fu nodded and Naruto turned to his own team as she, Arno, and Chojuro went to their own gate. "Our formation will be similar. Haku-chan up front, if you sense any immediate threats warn us. I'll be in the middle to react to them, and Shinji can watch our backs since he can sense body heat. You guys okay with that?"

"Yeah, yeah. Leave the rear to me leader-san." Shinji replied.

"I'll make sure to watch our front Naruto-kun." Haku said with determination.

As soon as they gathered in fron of their gate, Anko's voice could be heard over the intercom. "**ALRIGHT FRESH MEAT, THE SECOND EXAM HAS BEGUN! TRY NOT TO DIE SO QUICKLY** **NOW~!**"

All of the teams rushed in, as the exam was underway.

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After about an hour and fifteen minutes of tree hopping, the Oto teams met up. Naruto's team got there without incident, while Arno's team mey up with and quickly dispatched a team from Kusagakure (Village Hidden in the Grass) and secured the first Heaven scroll they needed. After meeting up, they got into a new formation with Shinji in front to keep track of heat signatures, Haku behind him, Arno in the middle, since as the strategist he needed to be guarded so he could react better, Naruto and Chojuro on wither side as the heavy hitters, and Fu in the back to keep a lookout with her dragonflies. After travelling for a few hours without running into any other teams, they decided to take a break.

"Alright, it's pretty dark, so we should camp here." Naruto said as they landed in a clearing. "Since there are six of us I think we should go scroll hunting after dark."

"What do you mean?" Fu asked

"It's about Eight right now, so we should separate into three teams of two." Naruto stated. "One team will be out searching while the two sleep. We'll keep going until morning or we have at least 3 Heaven and 3 Earth scrolls. Just in case we need extra." The others nodded "Since it's dark, the opposing teams should only have one lookout at a time. If you're quiet enough you can take out at least one member, be it the lookout or one of the ones resting before alerting them. That should even the odds a bit if you get into a conflict. Each team will have a tracker who will find opposing teams and a heavy hitter who will do the initial strike. Arno and Chojuro will be first team out. I know you're not exactly a tracking specialist Arno, but I'm sure you'll be fine."

"You can count on me Naruto-sama." Arno replied

"Right. Head as far as you can to the North and return in three hours at 11pm. Sweep any teams you find, and be careful out there." They both nodded and left. "Next up will be Shinji as the tracker and Haku-chan as the heavy hitter. I know Shinji is stronger, but Haku-chan has the speed advantage, so she may be able to take out more than one of the opponents. Besides, you're too flashy and would alert any nearby teams as well as your target."

Shinji pouted as Haku and Fu giggled at him

"When Arno and Chojuro get back, you two will head Southeast. Same orders, go as far as you can, take out anyone you find, come back at 2am. Fu and I will take the last shift and will head Southwest. We'll be back by 5am and then we'll all head out by 6. Any questions?" When no one said anything he continued. "Let's all eat and get some sleep. I'll make some **Kage Bunshin (Shadow Clones) **to set up traps and keep watch."

Three hours later the first group returned with an Earth scroll, while the second got ready and headed out. When they returned, they had the Heaven and an Earth scroll. Naruto and Fu decided to just keep a lookout for the rest of the night.

The next day, the group was making their way towards the tower when both Naruto and Shinji stopped suddenly, causing everyone else to stop as well.

"Oi, Leader-san. You feel that?" Shinji said in a serious tone while looking to the west.

"Yeah... I'd know this feeling anywhere. That vile chakra signature is something I wish I could forget." Naruto said in an equally serious tone,

"You can say that again. From the fluctuations, it seems _he _is in a fight with someone. No doubt toying with them." Shinji stated while shuddering slightly, causing everyone else to cock an eyebrow or look at the two quizzically. Whatever made the fearless Naruto and the ever confident Shinji stop and be serious for more than 10 seconds must be pretty big.

"U-um... Who a-are you two talking about?" Chojuro asked.

Shinji spared him a glance before looking back in the direction the chakra signature was coming from. "... Orochimaru." This caused the other four in the group to falter slightly before Fu spoke up.

"Hold up... Orochimaru? As in Orochimaru of the Sannin? One of the biggest and most dangerous traitors in Konoha history? _That_ Orochimaru?"

"Yeah." Naruto replied.

"What would he be doing here? And how can you two even tell it's him?"" Haku asked

"No idea what he's after, but whatever it is, it's not good." Shinji said. "As for your other question, we'll have to save it for another time. We need to help whoever he's attacking. If someone here has Orochimaru's attention then he no doubt something big planned for these exams."

"W-wait!" Chojuro exlaimed. "H-how are we going to take on one of the Sannin?! We're only genin!"

"That may be so Chojuro-kun" Naruto said looking back at him "But you forget just who the hell is in this group of ours." He started to grin confidently "I'm sure two jinchuuriki, a member of the Seven Swordsmen of the Mist, and a human blowtorch can handle the job. Not to mention Haku-chan and Arno-kun are no slouches either. It'll be even easier for us since he will be underestimating us too."

"Are you sure about this Naruto-sama?" Arno asked

"It's not like we'll be going in to fight him to the death. We go in, get his attention, distract him long enough for the people he's attacking to get away, then make our own escape as well." Naruto replied. Now let's get going, we've wasted enough time."

"Hai, Taichou!" everyone yelled out as they made their way towards the battle site.

* * *

Orochimaru was having a good week. He had finalized his invasion plans for his hidden village, Amegakure, to invade konoha, killed the Kazekage in Sunagakure while fooling the village into joining him, taken a nice long dip in a natural hot spring he accidentally came across, and now here he was, about to deliver his curse mark to one Uchiha Sasuke, the boy he would use as his next vessel so he could finally acquire the Sharingan and be one step closer to his dream of mastering all jutsu in the world.

It was relatively easy to get here too. Sneak into konoha during the second stage of the chunin exams, separate him from his white-as-a-sheet teammate, knock out his pet howler monkey (although not without wondering how it ever got it's fur to be _that _pink. I mean seriously, how is that even possible?), insult his clan a few times, and bing bang boom, everything falls into place. Ah yes. Life was good.

Just as he was about to stretch his neck and plant his curse mark on the unconscious Sasuke's body, he was forced to jump away as a blast of fire engulfed the spot he had been standing seconds before. He snarled and looked up, expecting it to be Sasuke's creepy looking teammate, only to find a familiar face standing on a branch before jumping down and landing between him and his prize, along with five other figures landing next to the first.

"Ku ku ku. Well look who we have here, Shinji-kun! Have you come back to be expiramented on again? My scientists have missed you." Orochimaru taunted before continuing "I would love to chat more, but I need to place my curse mark on little Sasuke-kun over there." looking at the rest of the group, the snake Sannin made some slight observations. A platnum blonde with a stoic expression? Boring. A girl with mint colored hair? What is it with kunoichi and bright colors these days? A blue haired boy with a huge bandaged sword? Obviously overcompensating for something. Raven haired girl with senbon? Meh. Then he saw someone else that caught his eye.

"Oh! Naruto-kun, how have you been? Have you reconsidered my offer to join me?" The snake faced man asked Naruto, who had a scowl on his face, which soon turned into a smirk.

"Sorry Orochi-chan" Naruto said with an amused tone "My parents always told me not to go off and play with pedophiles, so I'll have to decline." this caused the others to stifle their laughter despite the fact they were about to face off with a legendary ninja.

"I am not a pedophile!" Orochimaru yelled in anger.

"Really now? Well let's see..." Naruto in a thoughtful tone before entering a thinking position.

"You're out here, in the woods."

"Yes." Orochimaru replied

"Alone with a 12 year old boy." Naruto coninued

"Yes." Orochimaru answered

"Who is unconscious, and currently vulnerable."

"Yes."

"And you want to plant a curse mark on him."

"Yes."

"It'll most likely cause him to betray Konoha and join up with you."

"Yes, it will."

"And how do you plant those curse marks of yours again?"

"I bite the recipient in the neck." Orochimaru stated.

"And you no doubt want him for your next vessel."

"Correct. I'm mildly impressed you figured that one out so quickly."

"And to take a vessel you must push your soul into his body to take over, correct?"

"Indeed, although I don't know how you came across that little tidbit of information."

"Hmmmm..." Naruto said before snapping his fingers in a 'eureka' pose. "So to summarize, you're in the woods alone with an unconscious little boy so you can give him a hickey which will brainwash him to come to you so you can go inside of his body and push your essence into him?" Naruto concluded.

"That's right, I-" Orochimaru started before he stopped and caught on to what the blonde boy was suggesting. He then snarled looked angrily at the group who was trying, and failing miserably to contain their laughter.

"OKAY, THAT'S IT! I WAS GOING TO TOY WITH YOU AND LEAVE WITH YOUR LIFE, BUT NOW I'M GOING TO KILL YOU ALL!" the snake man shouted angrily.

"Well then" Naruto said tensing his body to prepare for an attack. "Let's get started shall we?" He then turned to his comrades. "I'll go in first and distract him. Arno, Fu, Chojuro, I want you to use Tri-Combination 3 on my signal." The three nodded before Naruto looked to his other side. "Haku, Shinji, I want you ready for Dual-Combination 7. I'll fire off my own attack after the first group's combo, and you two will move in directly afterwards. I want a 6 second interval between our attacks at the most. Give him no time to recover. Remember everyone, our objective is to recover Konoha team 7 and escape alive, not to fight this guy to the death. Lethal force is authorized, but go for detainment if anything. MOVE OUT!" Naruto finished as he rushed towards Orochimaru to engage him in taijutsu.

Naruto threw a punch to Orochimaru's side, which the snake Sannin blocked before dodging out of the way of an uppercut and jumping over the leg sweep Naruto threw as a follow-up.

"Ku ku ku, it seems you've gotten better Naruto-kun" The Sannin stated as he blocked more punches with relative ease before bending backwards an an impossible angle to avoid a kick to the chest. "Not to mention the fact that you sounded like a real leader back there. I wonder what those combinations you were talking about are?" He asked in a smug voice. He obviously didn't see them as a threat.

Naruto smirked as a Kage Bunshin materialized behind the Sannin and tried to heel-kick him in the back of the head. The Sannin lazily ducked the attack, making it miss by inches before the Original Naruto jumped back.

"ARNO, NOW!" He shouted before the platnum blonde boy from earlier was suddenly in front of him in the blink of an eye.

"**Josho kuresshendo (Rising Crescendo)!**" the boy shouted before channeling lightning chakra into his arm, but instead of sparks coming out like the Sannin expected, it started to vibrate heavily. The Snake summoner was then uppercutted multiple times in the span of a few seconds, each punch leaving the sound of a music note being played on a piano, before one final punch sent him flying into the air.

_'That speed! That should be impossible for someone his age! Just what is that boy?' _Oroshimaru thought. Before he could think more into it, he was interrupted by another voice.

"**Hiramekarei: UNLEASH!**" the blue haired boy from earlier appeared above him and he was slammed back into the ground as the Chojuro's sword transformed into a hammer. The impact caused a decent sized crater to appear when The sannin landed. Orochimaru was about to move when he felt a fist as hard as steel bury itself into his midsection, causing the crater to grow even more. Fu had used the Nanabi's youkai to harden the skin on her arm to form an 'exoskeleton' of sorts, causing it to turn black and several small spikes protruding out of her elbow and part of her forearm. Needless to say, it hurt like hell.

Fu jumped back as an explosive tag she left on the Sannin's stomach exploded. "How do you like that Snakey?" She taunted. "Tri-Combination 3, between Arno, Chojuro, and I. We like to call it **Triple Tech: Kiwamete Jūyōna Mono (Earthshaker)**." She stated.

"Good Job you three! Now grab Team 7 and start for the tower!" Naruto shouted, knowing it was far from over. The three nodded before picking up the unconscious members of team 7 and leaving. As he predicted, Orochimaru was in the middle of shedding his skin loke a snake, with a filly healed version of himself crawling out.

"Now that was devastating. It seems I underestimated you. But nothing will get in the way of my plans for Sasuke-kun" Orochimaru said.

Just as he was about to pull his legs out of his 'dead' body's mouth, Naruto appeared in front of him with his gauntlets out. He quickly wrapped Orochimaru in wire, trapping him, before cutting the ends of the wire off his gauntlets and resealing them. Orochimaru wasn't concerned in the slightest, seeing as how he had a smirk on his face, but it was replaced with a look of confusion as Naruto pointed both of his index fingers in the snake sannins face.

Now usually getting pointed at isn't that big of a deal, but when the skin starts to peel off the persons fingers and said skin starts to be replaced by a swirling crimson chakra? That's when things get weird.

"Yo Orochi-chan, How's it going?" Naruto said as his fingers started shooting out black and white balls of pure youki which started to converge into two spheres the size of baseballs at the tips of both of his extended fingers. Said spheres then started to compress to the size of specks that were just barely visible which then shot towards the bound Orochimaru at surprising speed.

"**Ko-Bijudama: Ougi (Mini Tailed Beast Ball: Secret Technique)**" Naruto started. Both spheres then exploded outwards at an incredible page, engulfing almost the entire clearing in black energy "**Futago no Shinsei! (Twin Nova)**!" He stated while jumping back and landing next to Shinji and Haku. "Get ready. once you guys trap him we're getting out of here and high tailing it to the tower as fast as we can." Naruto said while his teammates grunted in affirmative.

When the blast died down, the two went into position, Shinji extended both of his hands towards the crater and they both caught fire. Haku was behind him with both of her hands on his back, channeling Hyouton chakra into Shinji's body. The result was the fire on his arms going from a bright orange to a soft light blue. Shinji smiled manically "FINALLY I CAN BURN SOMETHING! SAY BYE BYE OROCHI-PEDO!"The light blue fire on his arms then shot out, completely covering the crater and some of the trees on the other side of the clearing, burning everything to ash before the flames solidified into ice.

"Dual-Combination 7" Shinji said panting slightly. "Using Haku's hyouton chakra as fuel for my fire. The result? **Dual Tech: Kōri-ō no Gōka (Dual Tech: Ice King's Hellfire)**. An inferno so cold it burns everything to ashes." He turned to Naruto, who was carrying Haku who had passed out from chakra exhaustion. _'We really need to figure out how to do that without me burning through all of her reserves...'_ he thought.

"Come on." Naruto stated "We should catch up with the others. I know for a fact that won't hold him for long. We're lucky he was underestimating us or we'd all be dead right now." Shinji nodded and they jumped off towards the tower.

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**A/N: Hope you enjoyed the chapter. I know It May not seem like much lengthwise, but I hope the action and slight comedy could make up for it a bit. Before you start saying the Oto group is overpowered, remember this: OROCHIMARU ENJOYS PLAYING AROUND BEFORE HE KILLS PEOPLE. I had them take advantage of this by going all out from the start.**

**I know you must be wondering how Shinji and Naruto know of Orochimaru already, well I hinted at Shinji being a test subject. It'll be explained next chapter, along with how the two met and since it'll be the preliminaries, I'll go more in depth to Shinji, Fu, Naruto, and Arno's abilities and finally give them a formal explanation.**

**Hope you enjoyed the chapter, and sorry for the wait! See you next time!**


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